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During the game, SportSouth played a clip of The Citadel Regimental Band playing at the 2010 Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo.

It was easily the highlight of the telecast for The Citadel.

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Sam Wyche struggled trying to come up with a positive for the Bulldogs. At one point, he noted that The Citadel had cut its turnovers in half from the week before. When the best thing that can be said about your offense is that it didn’t commit nine turnovers in consecutive weeks, your offense has issues.

(Wyche also struggled with calling Kevin Higgins by his right name, at least twice referring to “Mike Higgins” before sheepishly correcting himself. I think Wyche is a solid announcer, so I wouldn’t hold it against him. Calling a game like that one can be difficult.)

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The Citadel has been shut out in consecutive games for the first time in a decade. In case you were wondering, the last time the Bulldogs were shut out three times in a row was 1953, when The Citadel actually suffered four straight shutout losses. I would say that if the Bulldogs can’t put a crooked number on the board against Elon on Homecoming, it’s going to get ugly, but the fact is that it’s already ugly.

Not only have the Bulldogs been shut out twice in succession, in neither game did The Citadel snap the ball in the opponent’s “red zone”. The closest the Bulldogs have come to the opposing end zone in the last two games? In the Georgia Southern game, The Citadel reached the GSU 23-yard line before fumbling. Against Wofford, the deepest penetration was the Terrier 38-yard line, which is where The Citadel was when the game ended.

I didn’t understand why the Bulldogs did not make an effort to run more plays at the game’s end, to be honest. Why not at least try to score? What did they have to lose? I was disappointed in that.

The Bulldogs also put freshman Ben Dupree in at quarterback for the first time since the season opener against Chowan. Dupree, who had been playing at slotback, ran nine times for a net of three yards.

“Just trying to get something to jump-start the offense,” Higgins said. “In practice, when Ben’s in there, he usually breaks one or two for 50-plus yards. He did some things, but also put the ball on the ground, too.”

I’ve got to ask…if he has been breaking “one or two for 50-plus yards” in practice, why wasn’t he put in the game at quarterback in other games? Is there any particular reason a potential big-play threat wouldn’t have been useful against Georgia Southern, or Chattanooga, or Western Carolina?

The quarterback rotation in the game against Wofford was curious. Matt Thompson started, was replaced by Dupree, who was replaced by Thompson, who gave way to Sam Martin.

This might not be exactly right, so I apologize if I’m off by a play or two, but I think the rotation went like this: Thompson for two series (six plays), followed by Dupree for three series (fifteen plays), followed by Thompson for seven series (twenty-five plays), followed by Martin for two series (sixteen plays).

The Citadel managed only 143 yards of total offense. About half of that came during the last two series of the contest; Martin was in the game for both. That’s not to say he was necessarily playing better than the other two quarterbacks (after all, Wofford wasn’t playing many of its starters by that time), but the team did move the ball a little bit when he was in the game.

The defense turned in a respectable performance. It did allow two long scoring drives, but otherwise held up its end of the bargain. It has to be tough to constantly defend on your side of the field. Wofford’s average starting position on its offensive possessions was its own 44-yard line (although that’s better than last week, when GSU’s average drive started on The Citadel’s 40-yard line).

Eric Clanton and Tolu Akindele were noticeably active (Akindele forced two fumbles). Rod Harland led the team with ten tackles.

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Everyone knew this wasn’t going to be the easiest of seasons, not with the transition to the triple option offense. I think what is most frustrating, though, is that Bulldog fans really haven’t seen that much of the triple option in action.

Instead, they’ve seen constant problems with the exchanges between the quarterback and the center, and the quarterback and the fullback. It’s as if the play never develops, and the result is the quarterback being tackled for a three-yard loss, or a fumble, or both.

In addition, when The Citadel attempts a pass it is more often than not a “cover your eyes” situation.

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On to Elon. It’s Homecoming. My advice to alums returning for their reunions: concentrate on the tailgating.

All of that came on the road, against the #1 ranked team in FCS football. So how exactly did The Citadel only lose by 29 points?

Well, App State dialed it down some in the fourth quarter, but there were some positives for the Bulldogs, looking at the stat sheet:

— First, full credit to backup punter Alexander Wall for doing a nice job on short notice; he averaged 42.2 yards per punt and only allowed 10 total return yards

— While Matt Thompson started, Sam Martin did play and saw significant time, so his injury from last week apparently wasn’t serious

— The aforementioned PI aside, the Bulldogs only committed five penalties

— The Bulldog D did force two turnovers that counted, including a fumble that was returned 40 yards by Eric Clanton, setting up the game’s first score; a later interception by Brandon McCladdie was the first pick by an App State opponent this season

— The defense, despite giving up two big pass plays, allowed less than 400 yards of total offense, which against App State (and considering it was on the field longer than normal) wasn’t too bad

— App State was only 5-14 on third down conversions

— The Citadel blocked not one but two PATs

Okay, so maybe I had to stretch to come up with some of those positives, but I guess my final analysis of the game would go something like this: it could have been worse. Hey, the Mountaineers are ranked #1; the Bulldogs are not. It was never going to be a game for The Citadel to use in measuring its progress this season.

On the other hand, Saturday’s game against Georgia Southern is such a game.

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Prior to this season, Jeff Monken had spent the past 13 years as an assistant for Paul Johnson at three different schools — Georgia Southern, Navy, and Georgia Tech. (Monken was also a grad assistant at Hawai’i when Johnson was the offensive coordinator there.) He was hired by GSU to restore the triple option, and with it the glory days of Eagle football.

Perhaps the difference in expectations for the football programs at Georgia Southern and The Citadel can be summed up by this Monken quote:

“Who cares about transition years? Nobody cares about that. We want to win. I want to win, our fans want to win, our kids want to win. Nobody wants to hear about transition, or we’re young, or we’re learning. That’s a bunch of talk.

When you play a football game, you play to win. My expectation is the same for this season as it is for every season, and that’s to try and win every game. That’s what I expect.”

Contrast that with The Citadel, where most (although by no means all) fans are content to allow Kevin Higgins a “transition year” in the sixth season of his tenure at the military college. Of course, Monken knows that he has a little more leeway than what he expressed in the above quote. Georgia Southern fans aren’t expecting him to compete for the national title this year.

Next year, though, is a different story…

There are also those GSU supporters who aren’t that interested in the FCS national crown, because they would rather see the program move up to FBS land. I think that would be a mistake, at least as things are currently constituted in the two sub-divisions. I wrote about this last year, when GSU released its study on the issue.

Of course, now Appalachian State has decided it’s also going to study the pros and cons of making the move. It’s prudent to assess the landscape of college football, and I don’t blame either school for investigating their options. It’s my opinion, though, that unless there are major alterations in the world of FCS (or FBS), staying put is the way to go for the folks in Boone and Statesboro.

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Georgia Southern is 3-3, 1-2 in the SoCon. It looked for a while like Monken was ahead of schedule, for going into the game against Wofford the Eagles were 3-1 and ranked in the FCS Coaches Poll. However, a home loss to the Terriers was followed by last week’s setback at Chattanooga, and it’s clear that it’s not yet smooth sailing for GSU in conference play.

The biggest advantage Georgia Southern has had over The Citadel in re-instituting the triple option has been at quarterback, where the Eagles can rely on Georgia Tech transfer Jaybo Shaw, who not only ran the offense at Tech, but also ran it in high school. He’s not an explosive runner, but he can make all the reads and can also throw the ball fairly well (10.3 yards per pass attempt; 4 TDs, no INTs).

GSU is averaging 4.9 yards per rush. J.J. Wilcox is a solid slotback who can also catch the ball (his eleven receptions leads the team). Robert Brown is a freshman fullback who actually leads the Eagles in rushing, but he’s been hurt. There is no Adrian Peterson (GSU version, not Oklahoma version) suiting up this year for GSU.

Wilcox is the only GSU player with more than 95 receiving yards (he has 302). No other Eagle has more than six grabs, but when one does make a catch, it’s usually for a good gain. GSU receivers are averaging 19.1 yards per reception.

Georgia Southern has a young-ish offensive line (three juniors, a sophomore, and a freshman), and it’s been a little inconsistent. While the Eagles are fourth nationally in rushing offense, they have suffered eleven sacks, which is a lot for a team that doesn’t throw the ball too often.

On defense, the Eagles are led by Brent Russell, an interior lineman with 4.5 sacks, three other tackles for loss, and two pass breakups. He’s a very good player. Other than Russell, though, GSU is not particularly sack-happy, with 12 total sacks on the year. Georgia Southern has a solid, if not dynamic, group of linebackers and an improved secondary, although one with a tendency to give up the big play (five TD passes allowed of greater than 25 yards). Does that sound familiar?

Georgia Southern’s special teams have been outstanding. Placekicker Adrian Mora has not missed a field goal or extra point this season. He hasn’t been asked to kick long FGs (his longest this year is 41 yards) but he has made all that he has tried. Punter Charlie Edwards is the key factor behind the Eagles’ excellent net punting average of 39 yards, fourth in the country.

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Georgia Southern’s 3-1 start included a game at Navy. GSU lost that game, but only by a 13-7 margin. Considering it was a battle of triple option teams, both with Paul Johnson connections, I thought it was interesting that the game was low scoring.

The Citadel is also running a similar triple option system, of course. Will the Eagles defend the same way against the Bulldogs? And how exactly did they defend, anyway?

Well, a good person to ask would be The Birddog, chronicler of Naval Academy athletics and the unquestioned Tolstoy of the Triple Option. I’ve mentioned his blog before; for something of an introductory primer on the offense, here are a few posts from it:

I asked him a few questions about the Georgia Southern-Navy game. Some of the Q-and-A is below:

Question: I read that GSU defended the option in part by using its corners more aggressively (“firing the corners”) than is the norm. Is that correct?

Answer: The best way to defend firing corners is just to block. It’s not an uncommon move; Air Force, Wake Forest, and SMU did it too. The difference between the wins and the losses was personnel, specifically the slotbacks. One of our junior slotbacks who was injured to start the year came back against Wake Forest, and all of a sudden it was no longer a problem.

Question: Would the passing game be one way to combat that? Specifically, throwing the ball to a slotback, or maybe even the fullback (on a screen pass)?

Answer: There are ways to beat it in the passing game too. The simplest way is to just throw to the uncovered receiver. I think there’s a video of that in the Air Force writeup.

The cornerback blitz is as vulnerable to screen passes as any other blitz, and Navy runs a screen to the fullback in the direction of the blitz on occasion. The wheel-post works really well against blitzing corners too.

The safety has to roll over to cover the wide receiver, which leaves a linebacker to cover a slotback, which is usually a pretty favorable matchup for the offense. I have an example toward the end of this post: Link

Georgia Southern’s staff knew the Navy staff’s hand signals, so Navy had to stop going no-huddle early on. Brent Russell also played a very good game.

Question: Any thoughts on their splits?

Answer: GSU’s splits are wider than Navy’s. There was a rule enacted last year that prohibited anyone lined up outside the tackles from blocking below the waist back inside the tackle box. That’s why Navy’s slots line up with their inside foot inside the outside foot of the tackle. GSU doesn’t bother having their slots cut block inside anymore, preferring to keep the formation more spread.

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Thanks again to The Birddog for answering my (probably simpleminded) questions.

The passing game has been a sore spot for The Citadel this year, of course, so the notion that being able to successfully throw the ball against GSU’s defense might be a key to the game probably makes Bulldog fans a little queasy. The Bulldog slotbacks also must block well; perimeter blocking has been an issue for The Citadel all season.

Earlier in the post I linked Jeff Hartsell’s story about The Citadel’s anemic passing game. Here is an excerpt from that piece that is worth noting:

…the Bulldogs have to get some semblance of a throwing game in shape before Georgia Southern brings its version of the double-slot option to Johnson Hagood Stadium on Saturday.

Coach Kevin Higgins said Monday that offensive coaches will simplify their passing schemes this week in order to do just that.

“One thing we talked about as a staff (Monday) morning is simplifying what we are doing,” Higgins said at his weekly news conference. “Last week, we carried in 30 to 36 passing plays that you practice on a routine basis, based on what you might see in a game. At this point, I think we have a good idea of what our opponents will be running. Now, in my mind, we’ve got to get that 36 down to 10 or 15 plays.

“We need to run those plays well in practice every day, so that the quarterback is more confident, and receivers and everybody else are on the same page. So I think we’ve got to simplify and practice those specific plays more throughout the week.”

Hartsell also pointed out later in the story that the better you are at running the ball in the TO, the easier it is to pass it.

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It should be a nice day for a game on Saturday in Charleston, with sunny skies and temperatures in the mid-70s. Let’s hope that the sun finally shines on The Citadel in conference play.